Kono hohoemi
by Yui Miyamoto
Summary: As Yuuta is playing alone on a tennis court, he thinks about his mixed feelings for his brother Syusuke. (pairing: Syusuke and Yuuta)


Important note: This is shounen ai with two brothers. You have been warned.  
  
disclaimer: yui doesn't own prince of tennis.  
  
No, no.  
  
It doesn't matter the reason.  
  
I don't think of myself through blood or mind,  
  
I think of myself as myself.  
  
That is all I can start from.  
  
That is where I should work up from.  
  
Kono hohoemi… (This smile…)  
  
By miyamoto yui  
  
I wonder when it all started. When all the comments started to plague my mind until I almost hated my brother's name and my own within the same sentence. It became so unbearable at times.  
  
Sometimes, I had to lock myself in my room and listen to music to calm down. I wasn't going to cry. I was too old for that.  
  
Besides, if I did, my brother would worry.  
  
If there was one thing that I did not like more than being compared to him, it was for him to comfort me. Especially when it was he who was causing some of my misery, even though it wasn't intentional.  
  
I continued to play alone in this court. And I picked up the balls only to serve them over and over. I had to perfect them to make them my own.  
  
I could see my brother Syusuke in front of me. "You can do it, Yuuta!" he said to me so many years ago.  
  
That smile never changed, no matter how serious he got. This was one thing that made me always give into his jokes, comments, or whatever he asked of me.  
  
He never let me feel below him.  
  
But I did feel that way.  
  
When you were told almost everyday, "Aren't you the brother of that tennis tensai?" Or how about my favorite of, "Who's stronger? You or your brother?"  
  
It was never, "Isn't your name Fuji Yuuta?"  
  
People didn't know my name. They knew my title instead.   
  
I was branded the brother of the tennis tensai.  
  
I absolutely hated it.  
  
Thwack. THWACK.  
  
I continued to play at these courts alone even though the sun was starting to set.  
  
But when did I start to hate it all?  
  
I knew that inside my heart, it wasn't the comments at all. It was because I felt that he was going farther and farther away from me.   
  
My brother was the only one who saw me as myself. And if I lost that, who would I have at my side?  
  
I wasn't a tool. I didn't want to hold a title under someone else's accomplishments.  
  
I was Fuji Yuuta!  
  
I loved tennis too. I didn't play to compete with my brother. I played because I felt like I could do anything on the court. Even with all the talking, there was no one except my opponent in front of me.  
  
The words didn't touch me there. I was myself until I left the court.  
  
Syusuke, did you see me there?  
  
Did you see me as an opponent yet, Brother?  
  
I started to hit the tennis balls harder and harder. The sweat was pouring down the sides of my face as I breathed harder and harder.  
  
I played each game wondering how you saw me as your little brother. Was I just your little brother, or was I someone worthy of playing a match with? I wanted you to tell me so many things…  
  
But that smile was also in my way!  
  
"I wonder when did it happen…" I said as I felt my heart beat faster and faster.   
  
I bent my knees and jumped to hit the ball.  
  
THWACK!  
  
"You have to try harder, Yuuta," you kept on telling me when we played against one another. "You're still not there yet."  
  
I didn't understand it at all. None of it.  
  
Was I just a match along the way? I was nothing as a player to you, was I?   
  
What were you trying to tell me, Brother?  
  
The smile with closed eyes and your hand reaching out to me, I slapped it away thinking it was out of pity.  
  
I wanted to cry as I always did, but it wouldn't get anywhere.  
  
"I don't want your help!" I shouted these hateful words and looked at my brother, hoping that he would be hurt enough.  
  
Hurt enough not to leave me behind…  
  
Because no matter how hard I worked, I still couldn't catch up to you.  
  
Did you know that was what I feared when I was little? It was the day you would leave me all alone.  
  
That would be the day that I totally lost to myself.  
  
I still needed you to help me as my little brother, no matter what I said.  
  
"But when…" I said as I watched the blur of neon green suddenly get stuck in between the holes of the fence. "…when did this rivalry I put against us…"  
  
I gulped and I stood there in my place behind the baseline. In complete stillness, I finished, "…when did I love you more than I should have?"  
  
At my frustration, I wanted to throw my racket, but I ran to get the balls scattered around the court. Then, I began to practice all over again.  
  
Syusuke, you always tease me.   
  
That's the worse thing you could ever do to me.  
  
"Let's go on a date too, Yuuta?" you told me with that damned smile of yours.  
  
Half-sincere, half-joking. I turned red and shouted at your stupidity while inside, my heart skipped a beat.  
  
I know there is no chance at all and that this is wrong, but when you make me hope, I cringe inside of myself. This is one thing that I learned very well from you.   
  
You smile when you want to lie.  
  
I don't talk when I can't tell the truth.  
  
These were things in which we're very alike, weren't we?  
  
I shook my head as I tried my hardest to vent my frustrations out.  
  
Even though I hated being called the tennis tensai's brother, I was proud of you. But they never knew that each time you smiled, there was something you were hiding as well.  
  
I saw the times you cried by yourself because no one wanted to be your friend out of jealousy. I was with you when you were scared but acted so brave for me so that I would build up my courage.  
  
I was there at the times people came to you only because you were a tensai.   
  
This was a loneliness people would never see. Even our family didn't know because you hid it so well.  
  
But _I_ knew, Syusuke.  
  
You didn't want me to hug you even if that was the only thing I could do.   
  
That was why, no other person, until now, could love you as much as I did.  
  
I saw all your sides.  
  
The playful Syusuke who played on people's misery.  
  
The hurt Syusuke who took life so seriously he could kill with one glance.  
  
The intelligent Syusuke who read deeper into any move or emotion than people could have ever imagined.  
  
And I loved them all, Syusuke. But I didn't only love you because you were always there, but that you were amazing as everyone thought you were.  
  
I think you're amazing too, but for different reasons.  
  
I could see past the tennis. I saw past the name that went through the local tennis world.  
  
I could see you so clearly when you let me.  
  
"Yuuta!" my brother's voice said as he raised his hand to touch my shoulder.  
  
"Brother? What are you doing here?"  
  
The sun had set and I didn't notice that the evening had come.  
  
Without a word, he began to pick up all the balls that I had used. I wasn't even going to protest because he was stubborn in any situation.  
  
As we picked up the last of the green tennis balls, he asked me, "What were you doing here?"  
  
I got up and said while wiping the sweat from my forehead, "I needed to practice. And, I needed to think too."  
  
"Ah," he replied as he came over to me.  
  
Syusuke never let me down no matter how much I tried to push him away from me. That was just the type of person he was.  
  
That's why I could never truly get mad at him.  
  
"Can you beat me yet?" he teased as we walked out of the courts and walked home.  
  
I shook my head. "No, not yet, but I'm trying."  
  
"That's all you need to be doing."   
  
At that moment, he ruffled my hair and laughed. "You will someday. And I'll be ready for you."  
  
Then, half-sincere and half-jokingly, I said, "Will you wait for me?"  
  
"Just tell me the court and the day."  
  
I closed my eyes a bit. Yes, that was it…  
  
That's what I loved so much about you.  
  
And then, he pulled my head and kissed me on my forehead. Triumphantly, he smiled that grin I fell so hard for and detested as his opponent. I turned red and shouted, "Stupid brother!"  
  
As he walked a little ahead of me, I blinked at him and then I smiled with my head shaking. My face was as crimson as any red fruit. "How did you know where I was?"  
  
With that smile I both loved and hated, he answered me, "I always know where you are."  
  
Quietly, inside of myself, I was both so relieved and a little hurt because he didn't know or understand why. As the person that was fighting against him on the tennis court, as the person who was his brother, and the person who loved him with all of his heart…  
  
You always make me hope.  
  
That was the worst…  
  
…and the best thing about you, Syusuke.  
  
Owari.  
  
--  
  
Author's note: It is strange that I could not come up with a fic for other series. I had things in mind for my chapter fics of Tokyo Babylon, Chobits, and Hikaru no Go, but in the end, I heard 'Blood' and thought of a fic for Yuuta.  
  
I like Yuuta's character because it really hit close to home in a way. There is someone in each of us who always feels second best to someone else. And yet, I wanted to also make a fic about an under-represented pairing that I find quite cute. It may seem wrong, but I guess my reasons are spelled throughout the story. I guess this is the perspective I took with Seishirou and his mother whenever I wrote about them.  
  
No matter what constraints society puts, it cannot stop a person from feeling human. Only when people begin to believe the hype do they become lost within society.  
  
But most of all, I wanted to delve into the complexity of his feelings and bring them out as much as possible. 


End file.
